Wednesday, December 30, 2015

As we have noted, there is an ongoing scandal unfolding at the state Public Utilities Commission involving its former president Michael Peevey and a grant he tried to provide for a UCLA research program. However, as we have also noted, the scandal appears to be on the PUC side, not with UCLA. From the LA Times:

A state criminal investigation into the California Public Utilities
Commission centers on former President Michael Peevey's persistent
intervention into the process to assign costs for the failure of the San
Onofre nuclear power plant, newly released court documents show. Specifically,
Peevey pushed the idea of plant owner Southern California Edison
funding $25 million of greenhouse gas research at UCLA as part of the $4.7-billion settlement deal. The power plant on San Diego County's north coast closed following a
radiation leak in January 2012. A deal assigning 70% of the premature
closure costs to utility customers has since been repudiated by two of
the consumer groups that negotiated it, amid revelations about
undisclosed private meetings, known as "ex parte" meetings, between
regulators and utility executives. A sworn affidavit by an
investigator for California Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris, unsealed last
month, lays out the developing criminal case in detail for the first
time. The 18-page document says improper meetings were held,
which might bring misdemeanor charges, but that a conspiracy to commit
those misdemeanors could be considered a felony...

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Yours truly has often wondered if a Bruincard (which is a government-issued photo ID) would pass muster at an airport, should a driver's license be lost. An article in the Sacramento Bee notes that many states are not in compliance with the federal RealID law with regard to their licenses.* It provides a link** to a Homeland Security website which, in turn, indicates that California is not in compliance and has an extension to comply until January 10, 2016 (which isn't all that far away!). In any case, my totally unauthoritative investigation suggests that a Bruincard won't do it for you. But it might supplement other ID if you find yourself at an airport without your license and have to convince someone to let you on a flight.
----
*http://www.sacbee.com/news/nation-world/article52022280.html
**http://www.dhs.gov/real-id-enforcement-brief
----
You might have trouble getting FROM the airport, but not because of a lack of ID. See below:

Changing Faculty Employment at Four-Year Colleges and Universities in the United States

by Liang Zhang, Ronald G. Ehrenberg

NBER working paper #21827

December 2015

Abstract: We use panel data models to examine variations and changes over time in faculty employment at four-year colleges and universities in the United States. The share of part-time faculty among total faculty has continued to grow over the last two decades, while the share of full-time lecturers and instructors has been relatively stable. Meanwhile, the share of non-tenure track faculty among faculty with professorial ranks has been growing. Dynamic panel data models suggest that employment levels of different types of faculty respond to a variety of economic and institutional factors. Colleges and universities have increasingly employed faculty whose salaries and benefits are relatively inexpensive; the slowly deteriorating financial situations at most colleges and universities have led to an increasing reliance on a contingent academic workforce.

Sunday, December 27, 2015

We earlier posted on a "campus climate" issue that occurred recently.* It appears to be a continuing matter, based on a submission posted yesterday in the Daily Bruin (see below).

Some blog readers may recall that back in 2011, when a student posted derogatory comments about "Asians in the library," Chancellor Block posted a YouTube personal reply. (See also below.) So far, nothing has been heard from the chancellor on the latest incident; he apparently delegated someone else to reply. (And that reply apparently went to a list of students as an email and has not been otherwise circulated in contrast to his 2011 YouTube video.)

The Bruin post:

Submission: Bigoted Facebook posts are most recent
examples of anti-Semitism at UC

On Dec.16, 2015, Vice Chancellor Janina Montero
released an email in reference to anti-Semitic Facebook posts shared by a
member of our community.

While I applaud Vice Chancellor Montero for condemning
the hateful rhetoric, the email – without context or explanation – was
inadequate.

Individuals at UCLA have long accused the Jewish
community of having what they refer to as “Jewish privilege.” That email,
without context, may be used to play into their twisted narrative. Moreover,
many students were unaware of the incident before receiving the email, leaving
them confused. Therefore, for the sake of transparency, I write this piece to
share with the Bruin community the words that were so offensive they warranted
such a response.

On Dec. 8, 2015, the administration was made aware
that a student at UCLA, who also works at the UCLA Center for Prehospital Care,
had made unapologetically anti-Semitic comments on a Facebook post by UCLA alumna Mayim Bialik about Zionism.

This individual employed traditional anti-Semitic
rhetoric to attack the Jewish people, the Jewish state and the Jewish faith.
These statements are rooted in nothing but hate, which is why they can and should
be characterized as nothing other than blatant anti-Semitism.

She makes dehumanizing and stereotypical allegations
about Jews and the power of the “Jewish collective,” saying, “You’re f—ing
trolls, armchair politicians who do nothing but pick your nose, scratch your a–
… you come into our communities and destroy our small businesses.” She then
goes on to say, “You own the entertainment industry, and apparently you have so
much power that you want to get me fired and sent back to the ditch I came from,
don’t you? Flex your little muscles, do your worst … Where I come from, people
like you, with your privilege and your wealth, are not welcomed because we know
that with you comes the end of our world, sacrificed at the whims of your
fancy.”

The student then attacks the Jewish state and the
legitimacy of Jewish self-determination saying, “Go back to Israel, then f—ing
Zionist pigs. You don’t belong here either, this land belongs to the indigenous
people who were already here. Since you’re so superior, go murder some
Palestinian children so you can have their parents arrested and move into their
home. Greedy lifeless pieces of s— people. Capitalist colonizers who steal and
kill from other races to promote your dead ideologies.”

To add pain to injury, she has the audacity to speak
ill of the Jewish experience during the Holocaust. She says,“… Spare me your
(H)olocaust stories. My people have been systematically enslaved and destroyed
by this country, who removes them every time they become a nuisance to white people.
No one is hauling your Jewish a– to a concentration camp today …”

She adds, “… go back to Poland or whatever
freezer-state you’re from, and realize that faith does not constitute race,”
completely denying the fact that Jews were almost always treated as
second-class citizens in Europe, if they were treated as citizens at all.

Lastly, the student then savagely denies any and all
diversity of the Jewish community saying, “If you’re a Jew, you’re white. Not
black, not middle eastern, not Asian – white.”

And let’s not forget her final farewell, “Kiss my a–
you Zionist bastards – I hope you all burn in hell on earth for the crimes
committed by your people in the name of their Gods.”

In just a little over a year at UCLA I have interacted
with remnants of anti-Semitism far too often. They come in the form of
“conversations” about Israel, speeches about purported human rights, and
eligibility for student leadership positions. It is the new normal and it is
numbing.

But what sends chills down my spine is that in this
instance, anti-Semitism has manifested itself into the most clear, evil form of
rhetoric. It can no longer be absolved or manipulated by subjectivity. In this
instance, anti-Semitism is indisputably right before our eyes.

Anti-Semitism is alive and well all over the world –
least of all at a revered higher education institution like UCLA.

This incident is not unique, nor are the statements
shared by the perpetrator new. Hateful rhetoric, discriminatory attitudes and
bigoted sentiments against the Jewish community exist across the UC – it is a
fact we can no longer afford to deny.

Am I appalled by this incident? Absolutely.

Am I surprised? Never.

This is the reality of being a Jewish student on a UC
campus today.

Mokhtarzadeh is a second-year
political science student and vice president of Bruins for Israel.

Below is the video made by Chancellor Block in 2011 in response to the "Asians in the library" video:

Some spammers have a better command of English than others. But - more seriously - this is just one of our periodic reminders that clicking on email links can be dangerous. In this case, apart from the clumsy English, note that the return email address has nothing to do with Skype. But even if it seemed to come from Skype, clicking on "view mails" could be dangerous. (Clicking on it in this screenshot image won't produce anything, however, so don't worry.)

Saturday, December 26, 2015

...The University of California system says it plans to equip police at its 10 campuses with body cameras in late-2016. "We are working to finalize a systemwide policy on the use of body
cameras," says Kate Moser, with the University of California Office of
the President. "We are consulting model policies and best practices to
inform our policy. The campus police chiefs estimate that the campuses
will fully implement body-worn cameras in the latter half of 2016."

Thursday, December 24, 2015

Two views of the State Normal School (1898 top; 1905 below) that eventually became UCLA. At the time of these photos, it was located where the main library in downtown LA is sited. The School then moved to Vermont Avenue (where it was later turned into UCLA and where LA City College is now located).

Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Yours truly noted that apparently few get sick and need to see their docs as the long Christmas weekend approaches. Above: Parking lot - normally crowded but not today - under the 100-200 buildings at UCLA. Is this the reverse of the dead grandmother syndrome? http://www.psy.gla.ac.uk/~steve/best/grandma

Tuesday, December 22, 2015

The San Diego Union-Tribune has been pursuing the scandal at the state Public Utilities Commission revolving around its former chair, Michael Peevey. The heart of the scandal involves matters before the Commission that were not properly handled. Both Berkeley and UCLA were drawn into the matter but the involvement involves activities very peripheral to the scandal.

In early April, days before The San Diego Union-Tribune
reported that state criminal investigators had raised questions about
UCLA dealings with the California Public Utilities Commission, the
newspaper requested emails and other documents from the university under
the state Public Records Act. The law requires public
institutions to comply within 10 days, but this week UCLA notified the
Union-Tribune that it would delay its response for the sixth time and
records now are expected to be released early next year...

As far as yours truly understands, there was no illegal activity or wrong-doing at UCLA. If there was a problem, it was on the Peevey/PUC side. So getting the documents to the Union-Tribune sooner rather than later would be a Good Thing.

The story is also a reminder of something we have repeatedly noted on this blog. Your emails - especially at a public university - should not be viewed as private. Some of them may be private but don't count on it. And even ones that might be private have a way of circulating in ways you can't control.

Monday, December 21, 2015

[Beginning of rant.] As we have blogged about from time to time, UC - thanks to the Committee of Two - is now embarked in trying to come up with a pension plan for new hires that will operate with the same PEPRA cap as CalPERS. And, as we have also noted, the PEPRA cap is not suited for UC and its faculty. So any feasible scheme will at best be a way of coping with a bad deal.

The fact is that from the point of view of politicos - such as the two governors who negotiated a pension deal for UC - all pensions are the same. So why should one be any different from another in terms of its underlying formulas? But the two plans are not equal. CalPERS is unlike UC's pension plan in many ways. For example, the trustees of the UC plan are the Regents. The function of the Regents was (is) to keep UC insulated from politics. That goal has not always been achieved, but that insulation is the purpose. In contrast, as the Calpensions online newsletter reminds us today, CalPERS has governance issues related to its board and basic institutions.* UC has not had a bribery scandal; CalPERS has, for example.

Sunday, December 20, 2015

From time to time, this blog - as a public service - provides a progress report on the construction of UCLA's Grand Hotel. Given the current excitement about the new Star Wars movie, we thought we would give you a musical update. (Sorry: Won't work on iPhones.) See below:

Saturday, December 19, 2015

A new payroll system that has given the University of California years of trouble just uncovered another problem: UC has routinely underpaid thousands of its employees by small dollar amounts on each paycheck.In
a Dec. 1 letter to the U.S. Department of Labor, the university asked
for assistance in resolving what it deemed a “compliance issue.” While
working to switch over to the new payroll system, a lawyer for the Board
of Regents wrote, UC discovered that there have been regular issues in
calculating extra pay, such as overtime. “The reasons for these
failures are complex,” the letter stated, pointing to a variety of
incompatible timekeeping methods across its 10 campuses. “We would like
to reach a suitable resolution that would provide retroactive payments
to affected employees.”

The extent of the issue is unclear. UC
declined to specify a number of employees affected, but a “frequently
asked questions” list on the university’s website said “less than 20% of
UC’s workforce,” which could mean up to nearly 40,000 people. Spokeswoman
Dianne Klein said the “vast majority” of cases were less than $5 per
biweekly paycheck and more than half were less than $1. Some employees
were also slightly overpaid, she added...

We write to acknowledge that the placemat distributed in some of your dining halls this week failed to account for the many viewpoints that exist on our campus on some of the most complex issues we confront as a community and society today. Our goal was to provide a framework for you to engage in conversations with peers and family members as you return home for the winter break, however, it was not effectively presented and it ultimately caused confusion in our community. On behalf of the Office of Student Life and the Freshman Dean’s Office, we offer our sincere apologies for this situation.

Academic freedom is central to all that Harvard College stands for. To suggest that there is only one point of view on each of these issues runs counter to our educational goals. We appreciate the feedback that we have received about this initiative. Moving forward we will, with your continued input, support the growth and the development of independent minds.

Sincerely,

Stephen LassondeDean of Student Life

Thomas DingmanDean of Freshmen

===

And since the placemat appeared in a dining hall, the two deans might have let the Platters say it for them:

Friday, December 18, 2015

Note: Blog readers will know that the legislature, contrary to the Master Plan (or any process to amend it), decreed that some community colleges should give 4-year degrees.A handful of California’s community colleges may have a problem offering new bachelor’s-degree programs, as planned, by 2017. The Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges, one of
the nation’s seven regional accreditors, had asked the U.S. Department
of Education to allow it to accredit baccalaureate programs at two-year
colleges. The change sought by the commission, called an "expansion of
scope," is necessary because the state is allowing 15 of the community
colleges to offer four-year degrees. But a federal panel that advises the secretary of education on
accreditation matters voted on Thursday to limit the accreditor’s
ability to approve new baccalaureate programs. That could leave as many
as four colleges unable to begin offering those degree programs before a
fall 2017 deadline...

The UCLA "campus climate" seems to have gotten chilly, apart from the weather. From the Bruin:

A UCLA official criticized anti-Semitic comments made by a UCLA
student on Facebook in an email statement sent to the student body
Wednesday. Janina Montero, vice chancellor for student affairs, sent the email
after a pro-Israel group on campus condemned an undergraduate student
for a series of comments posted on the Facebook status of Jewish actress
and UCLA alumna Mayim Bialik. UCLA spokesman Ricardo Vazquez said the vice chancellor’s decision to
send out emails is made on a case-by-case basis, and Montero felt this
incident rose to a level that warranted the email. In the comments, the student called Jewish people “troglodyte albino
monsters of cultural destruction” and “capitalist colonizers.” The student did not respond to several requests for comment for this article.

Vazquez said the university will not pursue disciplinary action
because the First Amendment protects individual’s private speech. In the email statement, Montero urged students to treat others with compassion and to not stereotype other identities. “The hurtful and offensive comments displayed ignorance of the
history and racial diversity of the Jewish people,” she said. “Bigotry
against the Jewish people or other groups is abhorrent and does not
represent the values of UCLA or the beliefs of our community.” Liat Menna, president of Students Supporting Israel at UCLA, the
group that criticized the student’s comments, said she thinks Montero’s
statement was inadequate because it did not address the issue of
anti-Zionism. Zionism is the belief that Jewish people should have an
independent state, such as Israel. “The demonization of Jewish students on campus is directly linked to the demonization of the Zionist identity,” she said. Vazquez said the university is working to prevent similar incidents
through community collaboration initiatives, the Diversity Requirement
and more accessible ways of reporting bias.

Not surprisingly, the incident has begun to circulate on the internet:

Recently, a student at UCLAwho is also a UCLA employee posted a Zionophobic rant on Facebook. Lisa Mendez introduced herself to the public with a blatantly racist declaration in responseto a post written by Miayim [sic]Bialik, a UCLA alumna and respected Hollywood actress. Mayim’s post was a declaration of Zionist pride and for Lisa this was an opportunity to attack:

"GTFOH with all your Zionist bullshit. Crazy ass fucking troglodyte albino monsters of cultural destruction. Fucking Jews. GTFOH with your whiny bullshit. Give the Palestinians back their land, go back to Poland or whatever freezer-state you're from, and realize that faith does not constitute race” (Mendez)

Lisa’s statements frightened and appalled many people. Her employment status as a healthcare administrator for UCLA Center for Prehospital Care (CPC), raised even bigger concerns. Many were outraged...

A full copy of the Montero email was not available, however, after a search of the UCLA website and a more general Google search. It is unclear to whom the email was sent. This incident is likely to be raised at the Regents' committee that was formed two meetings ago to deal with anti-Semitism and intolerance.

Thursday, December 17, 2015

The ad on the right popped up in an email subscription yours truly was using (Santa Monica Patch). If you click on the ad (which you can't do on our screenshot), it takes you to another page which contains the sentence:

"Now you can take the same test that noted psychiatry professor Gary
Small, M.D., uses with his patients for research studies at UCLA.
Answer the following questions about how you
judge your own memory ability. We'll email you your personal and
confidential results."

If you further click around that page, it appears to be connected to another site - newsmax - which runs news clips and ads. Is anyone paying for using UCLA's name? Small's name? Is permission required? Just asking.

Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Power Outage Leaves Thousands of Westwood Residents in the Dark

The Department of Water and Power Does not have an estimated restoration time.

About 23,000 Los Angeles Department of Water and Power customers in
the Pacific Palisades and Westwood areas were left without electricity
this afternoon after a circuit breaker failed, according to the utility. The
equipment failed at 1:37 p.m. and a portion of a receiving station that
services the affected areas was de-energized about 10 minutes later,
according to DWP spokeswoman Ellen Cheng...

Full story at http://patch.com/california/centurycity/power-outage-leaves-thousands-westwood-residents-dark

NOTE: Yours truly noted traffic jams building up to the west of UCLA due to signals not working. Be warned.

As you can see, the 300 UCLA Medical Plaza mystery is now resolved. As per the Steve Cederbaum hypothesis, it was renamed after Wendy and Leonard Goldberg, the couple who gave $10 million for a program to study migraine headaches. We might note that the 200 building was previously renamed for a donor. But the 100 building is still unnamed (in case you had any spare change).

The University of California
has named a well-known Silicon Valley entrepreneur to lead a new
venture capital fund aimed at bringing inventions based on faculty and
student research to market.

UC President Janet Napolitano
announced Tuesday that TIBCO Software founder Vivek Ranadivé would
oversee the independent fund that will be launched with $250 million
from the office that manages the university's investments.

Ranadivé, a best-selling author and co-owner of the NBA's Sacramento Kings, says he plans to secure additional funding from private investors and to contribute a 5 percent stake himself.Napolitano says the university's earnings would be funneled back into its retirement and endowment accounts.

But
she says the venture fund's main purpose would be to finance the
development of promising products in areas such as life sciences,
technology, energy and agriculture.

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

From time to time, our blog brings you samples of med art, artworks on the walls of the UCLA medical complex. Presumably, the donors received a tax deduction for their in-kind contributions. In this case, we have illustrations from an obscure children's book that can be seen in the 200 building. The illustrations with accompanying labels might be seen as an ad for the book, not just art. So we won't give you name.

Monday, December 14, 2015

The mystery of the new name of the 300 UCLA Medical Plaza building may be resolved later today. But as of this morning, it still awaited unveiling. As you can see, a truck was delivering supplies for a tent and reception. We'll keep you informed.

Mihai Gherghina sacrificed sleep, study time and Thanksgiving holiday
fun to make the application deadline for a long-cherished goal:
transfer to a UC campus. When he clicked the "submit" button Nov.
29, a day before the deadline, the Orange Coast College student said he
felt huge relief. But that emotion turned to fury when UC officials announced three
days later that they would extend the deadline to Jan. 4 for those who
missed it — but not those who made it, like Gherghina. The 26-year-old
student said he has learning disabilities and could have used the extra
time to hone his essay and burnish his application with another honors
program he subsequently learned he had been admitted to...

The deadline extension, the first in years, has created major buzz — and
decidedly mixed reactions — up and down the state. UC officials said
they extended the deadline to expand the pool of high-quality transfer
applicants needed to help fill the 5,000 additional seats being
earmarked for California students next year and 5,000 more over the
following two years. The expansion was approved last month by the UC
Board of Regents, which has come under political pressure to allot more
seats to Californians after years of increasing spaces for out-of-state
and international students who pay full tuition...

Sunday, December 13, 2015

Usually, the month of December is characterized by slow leaks of items that will be in the governor's proposed budget, due in early January. In fact, given the time needed to put the budget together, officials have to have a pretty good idea of what it will be by now. However, the governor has been in Paris until recently at the climate conference. So we may be a bit delayed this year in leaking. But it will come.

Given the recent mayhem in San Bernardino, the stabbing incident at
UC-Merced in early November has been pushed from the national headlines. But
not entirely, as will be noted below. Not surprisingly, it still is newsworthy
in the local Merced area.* However, beyond the local news, various conservative
news media allege a cover up of the UC-Merced incident, i.e., that it was
really terrorism. The allegation arose shortly after the event** and continues
to the present.***

Shortly after the UC-Merced incident, the local sheriff
indicated that the student perpetrator was not a terrorist – presumably meaning someone
acting out of religious and/or political beliefs. It was instead due to the mental
issues of someone angry about being rejected from a study group. This
interpretation was based on a manifesto the stabber left behind. The document
was reportedly slated to be released a few days after the incident.**** Put
another way, the Merced incident was similar to the incident at UC-Santa
Barbara in May 2014 where the perpetrator killed people out of anger at not
having a girlfriend. In that case, the killer left behind a manifesto “explaining”
his motives.

In contrast, the UC-Merced manifesto hasn’t been released,
although there have been various news reports since the incident that somehow interpret what is
allegedly in it. At least one blogsite has filed a public documents request
which has been rejected. See below:

…In pursuit of the story PipeLineNews.org LLC filed a formal CA Public
Documents Act request asking to be provided with an un-redacted copy of Mr.
Mohammad’s manifesto. This morning we received the following reply:

“Upon review, we have concluded that the information you have requested
is integral to an ongoing investigation. The disclosure of it at this time
would endanger the successful completion of that investigation. Therefore we
are denying your request at this time…”

Yours truly suggests that the conspiracy/terrorism
interpretation could be quickly put to rest if the UC-Merced police would
simply release the manifesto (and whatever other relevant documents there are). Surely
the UC-Merced police have a copy or could get one from the Merced sheriff. The
local sheriff shortly after the event said, "We had an upset teenager that was upset because he got kicked out of a
study group."**** Given that official view – no terror conspiracy/just individual mental
problems – a view which has not changed in any news report since, there remains
only the Galanter hypothesis (see above) as to why the manifesto has not been
released, even without a public document request. With all the calls for “transparency”
in public matters, not honoring the request seems like bureaucratic
incompetence.

***http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/12/10/with-spotlight-on-san-bernardino-yet-more-questions-about-college-knife-attack/Excerpt: …Yet, more than a month after the Nov. 4 attack at University of
California Merced, local and federal authorities continue to insist that Faisal
Mohammad, 18, carried out the vicious attack because he'd been banished from a
study group. (John) Price, whose son Byron Price, a 31-year-old construction
manager for the family business who was working nearby and was stabbed when he
heroically intervened, suspects the White House's reluctance to identify acts
of radical Islamic terror has trickled down to investigators who are still
probing the Merced attack…